The ever increasing scale of integration of integrated circuits has resulted in increasingly smaller device dimensions and has further resulted in device components being positioned closer and closer together in a semiconductor substrate. The close proximity of device structures results in problems in isolating device structures. For example, the demand for increasingly higher scales of integration of integrated circuits has resulted in field effect transistors in which the source regions and drain regions of the transistors are positioned closer and closer together. In this particular circumstance, the close proximity of the source region and the drain region can result in electrical conduction between the source and drain that is not responsive to the formation of a conductive channel in the substrate as a result of activation of the gate of the transistor.
Particularly, if the device is of the partially depleted silicon on insulator type (PD-SOI), the buried insulator or other device components that are in close proximity to the source region and drain region can function as an undesirable back gate of the device and facilitate leakage. Once the back channel leakage exceeds a limit under which the field effect transistor is designed to work, the transistor is no longer operating in a desired manner, which can negatively affect the overall operation of the integrated circuit and can possibly result in damage to the circuit.